Absolute Virtue of Prayer
by TheHighestPie
Summary: Medieval monastery AU: Brother Grantaire doesn't know if there's any difference between longing after Brother Enjolras or longing after his blazing awareness of the sacred. Enjolras, meanwhile, is in the process of finding his true creed.
1. On the brink of the great mystery

Contains fundamental cluelessness about the actual workings of monastic life. I'm intentionally not specifying their time and order so I have greater freedom to Make Shit Up. Beware of grossly anachronistic allusions to St. John of the Cross.

The copious amounts of violent death are in the perhaps unnecessary second part, because that's how this fandom rolls.

Titles from the "Parenthèse" section of the convent digression.

* * *

He regularly volunteers for extra duties cleaning the chapel. It's the only way he can watch Brother Enjolras praying alone at dawn.

He moves as quietly as his inelegant form will allow, sweeping the floor and polishing gilded statues of saints that are not half so beautiful as the golden figure kneeling boldly in the chancel. Brother Grantaire tries not to look too blatantly at him, but knows that his head is always unbowed. Enjolras' chin tilts naturally up to the heavens. It is the stance of one who does not know sin.

Enjolras prays at all hours and in all places. He copies texts assiduously, he works the vegetable plots with surprising strength, and he shares easy smiles with his brothers, but as soon as he is allowed a moment of repose, his face goes still and his otherworldly blue eyes fall half-closed. It is as if every moment of his existence is a communion with the ineffable.

Grantaire constantly watches him, hoping to catch the flashes of light in his eyes, and the beautiful arch of his upturned neck.

—-

The elders of their community have begun to take note of Enjolras' apparent ecstasies. Some want to encourage his contemplations, other to curtail them. Until they can come to a consensus, they wait and watch, curious to see what will come of the strange being who has alighted in their midst.

They have also begun to take note of Grantaire.

The abbot calls him in to speak of his spiritual progress. He has nothing to say, so begins to chatter something about Aquinas, until the abbot senses the emptiness of his words and silences him. He calls for Grantaire to center himself with a moment of quiet prayer before they continue.

Grantaire's mind is never quiet. He is an anomaly in their order. To be sure, he is not the only young initiate who struggles with the life of contemplation and self-abnegation. Brothers Courfeyrac and Bahorel in particular chafe against the stone walls that hem in their sky, but their prayers are beautiful and sincere when they manage to still their over-free hearts. They may not yet be at peace with their fates, but they will find their places here because they _believe_. Grantaire has seen what it means for a man to be suffused with the sacred, and knows he will never feel it for himself. As much as he wishes to lose himself in the same light that fills their eyes (Enjolras' eyes), he knows that volition cannot conquer volition and that ego cannot efface ego.

He confessed this, once, to his most beloved brother – this desolation of heart. Enjolras regarded him with uncomprehending compassion, and told him to persevere through his dark night of the soul. Enjolras sees the light without because he dwells in the light within. He cannot understand that Grantaire does not journey through darkness but squats within it; it is Grantaire's native element.

The abbot asks Grantaire if he needs to reconsider his calling. He is indolent in his work, careless in his lettering, distractible in his prayer, and off-key in his singing. He was a tolerable helping hand in the brewery, but he remains banned from there until the brothers can again learn to trust him among the barrels. Is this truly the life he wishes for himself?

Grantaire knows there is no life for him in the monastery, but there is even less of a life outside. In here he is an absence; out there, he is nothing. It is better to live as a negative than a nonbeing. He clutches at the rosary looped around his rough rope belt and swears greater diligence.

He is commanded to make extra confession this week. He obediently appears, and self-flagellates as well as anyone could ask, but does not confess everything. There are some things he has never fully voiced, not even to himself.

—-

The bishop comes and gives a sermon on love.

Grantaire cannot speak the word love, for if he knows love, then he must know God.

Love is patient. Love wants nothing for itself. Love knows no distinctions, so knows no envy.

The selfish 'love' that seeks its own gain is called lust. The brothers will never be perfect, the bishop acknowledges, but the monastic life is a blessing because in allowing them to give up everything, it frees them from the pull of lusts. They have no possessions, no ambitions, no particularity, so can love all beings in perfect, disinterested equality.

Grantaire has no trouble admitting in his head that this generic, unattached love sounds like utter nonsense – but it is with a swell of shame that he therefore gives a name to his lust.

It is lust that grows and twists inside him when he sees the impossible ease of Enjolras' meditations. It is lust that bubbles into jealous bile when he catches Enjolras comfortably draped over Brother Combeferre's shoulders as they pore over a manuscript, when Brothers Enjolras and Prouvaire sing together in glory-bright harmonies, when Brother Courfeyrac coaxes startling laughter out of that serious face. Lust draws Grantaire's eyes to the most brilliant images of angels in the stained glass windows of their sanctuary. Lust strains his ears to pick a single voice out of the choir. And lust leaves him cold and alone and aching in his cell at night when images come unbidden of golden hair and an ardently arched neck.

—-

It is near sunset on the last Saturday before Epiphany. To reflect the new liturgical season, the paraments around the monastery need to be changed. The fabric draping the altar in the main sanctuary will be replaced with appropriate ceremony and song, but the task in the simpler side-chapel has been entrusted to Grantaire.

He opens the doors to the short nave, and feels a wash of dismay and delight when he sees Enjolras kneeling upon his heels at the front. The light through the large western window bathes him in a pool of oranges and blues. Grantaire wonders if Enjolras has even noticed the tinted sunlight creeping up over his back as the minutes have passed.

Grantaire closes the door as quietly as he can with his armful of bulky paraments, crosses himself, and creeps up the central aisle, wishing the chapel were large enough for side passages. It is with tender embarrassment that he forces himself to walk through Enjolras' full-body halo.

He can pretend to ignore the presence behind him once he is busy in the chancel – until he hears a small cry while straightening the altar's fresh runner.

Enjolras has risen fully up to his knees, his palms open wide at his sides. His breathing is fast and shallow. Illuminated from behind, he is exquisite beyond all imagining. Grantaire knows he will never see heaven, because he can think of nothing more wondrous than what he sees in this moment. He is an idolater, and does not repent a moment of the only joy he knows.

Enjolras' eyes and mouth fly open in the same moment. He blinks a few times as the bright chapel comes into focus.

"Brother!" he gasps. He is looking at and through Grantaire. "Brother, I have been visited by a vision. I have seen unveiled before me a new kingdom, one that already waits within us. All we need do is dare to bring it to life."

A long, slow smile dawns on his face. "From here, from this day on, everything is going to change."

Grantaire can only nod dumbly, transfixed by that bright gaze.


	2. And how glorious the transfiguration!

I remain unconvinced of the necessity of this second half. See it as an optional coda.

* * *

The heresy trial, when it comes six heady years later, is a mere formality. Enjolras (no longer "brother") is charged with false teachings, insubordination, and leading others into error. Those teachers who have loved him privately beg him to recant, but to no avail. He and those who refuse to abandon him are sentenced to burn.

Grantaire is not enough of a thinker to attract the court's suspicion. His name adorns no condemned tracts. When questioned, he can barely describe Enjolras' censured doctrines, let alone espouse them with any conviction.

The first seven burn together, with a circle of priests around them chanting prayers for their souls. Enjolras is forced to watch, to see what grief he has wrought upon their community. He does not apologize, and the expressions of his friends demand no forgiveness.

Grantaire wonders what God would demand such a sacrifice. The smell of burning flesh and hair is no joy to his mortal nostrils. He wants to scream, to vomit when he thinks of whose ash he will soon be breathing into his unsanctified lungs, but he is helpless, helpless.

Enjolras is led to the pyre the next dawn. He receives no final blessings. He begins to sing a vernacular song as the executioner lights the condemned tracts crumpled up at his feet for kindling. He seems unaware of the flames rapidly rising around him, but his voice falters as the first wave of hot smoke hits his face.

Grantaire's gruff voice picks up the line of French where it dissolves into Enjolras' gasping. Bright blue eyes suddenly meet his own through the smoke. Enjolras nods and smiles at him, just as he had smiled on the last day of Christmas all those years ago.

Then he is running, punching the brother who tries to hold him back. As he approaches the pyre, he grabs the knife hiding in the folds of his robe.

Grantaire opens his throat as he flings himself onto the flames.

The last thing he hears is Enjolras above him, again beginning to sing.


End file.
